World's Driest Desert Flooded With Rare Color as Fall Flowers Bloom

Outside the North and South Poles, the Atacama Desert in northwestern Chile is the driest place on Earth. That doesn’t mean nothing grows there, though. The dense carpet of purple, pink, yellow, red, and blue flowers currently covering Atacama’s rocky hillsides is proof.

Such huge blooms in the Atacama are rare. The region sees about 0.08 inches of rain per year. By comparison, the US Midwest gets about 40 inches per year. The Amazon rainforests to Atacama’s east gets 108 inches. But this past winter (March-September in the Southern Hemisphere), Atacama saw many downpours. It got about 2.3 inches of rain. That was enough to summon the flowers.

“When certain moisture thresholds are met, (the seeds sprout), grow and then bloom,” Víctor Ardiles told The Associated Press (AP). Ardiles is chief curator of botany at Chile’s National Museum of Natural History.

Buried within the Atacama’s stony soil are the seeds of roughly 200 species of flowering plants. They lie dormant, often for years, until they can absorb enough moisture to sprout. They then transform the arid region into a burst of color.

In 2023, Chilean President Gabriel Boric set aside 220 square miles of desert around the Pan-American Highway as Desert Bloom National Park. It's now a protected region. Tourists can stop to glimpse the fleeting beauty of the flowers. Visitors will have until early November to take in the view. The flowers will have dried out by then.   

“It’s one of those rare things you have to take advantage of,” one tourist told the AP. “It’s more stunning than I could have imagined.” 

Reflect: What is something rare or unexpected in nature that you would love to experience?

Photo of flower bloom in Atacama Desert from Reuters